18-02-2013 [• workshops etc. ]
Nicolas Y Galeazzi organizes a week-long workshop within ‘What’s the matter with money?’, a reflexive and performative context at the BUDA arts centre in Kortrijk. An international group of artists gathers to reflect on the basic question of the workshop: ‘What is the currency of art?’ It attempts to understand ‘economy as an artistic practice’. This re-appropration of economy through art is approached by occupying economic structures and their terminologies and filling them with new practices and meanings. By colonizing the vocabularies, the practices and the appearances of economy, the group tries to tackle both the common value system of art and the common notions of economy.

The workshop of Y Galeazzi proves to be a perfect context to present and discuss the Shop Shop proposal with an international group of artists.
^{[read more about SHOP SHOP here >>>]}




introduction of the workshop by Y Galeazzi:

THE OBSCURE ECONOMY
The crisis disclosed the limits of knowledge. On the one side it became very clear, that most economists don't have a clue of what they are actually doing. Most of their prognoses are merely random and based on irrational tools like batting, assuming, trying, pretending, speculating or lying - packed in complicated mathematical equations and gordian knows of laws.

On the other hand it is part of the mechanism of this type of capitalism to systemically obscure the knowledge about the functionality of economy and the finance system. Since years a disinformation policy is on work, which tells us that economy is simply too complex to be understood by normal people, so they should let its guidance to the few economists and mathematicians, who know how to draw advantage out of the disguise.


HALF-KNOWLEDGE
Let's take this double bind in the general assumptions of the "too complex to be understood" as a gate way to take action based on our own blatant half-knowledge.

Half-knowledge is for me in this context a very positive, an emergent term. It makes me thinking the possible beyond the probable (which goes much further then 'speculation'). It inspires me to consciously or unconsciously misunderstanding a concept in order to break our common thinking patterns and to develop alternatives.

The workshop setting is therefor a generator of this kind of positive misunderstanding. At its base is the convention that we accept our knowledge only as a particle in the service of the construction of utopia.


WORKFLOW
Based on this convention I'm proposing a work flow. This will start with playing on words. We will start mornings with coffee and news, reading and discussing economic news papers and blogs. We will cut out, collect and recompose words; we will discuss them, trying to assume what they are and speculate upon what they could be. We will charge our own vocabulary and start to work them into our own new economic models - shivering between the reality and the alternative.
The two studios reserved for our workshop in the BUDA Tower shall be structured in different spheres, designed to work the misunderstood economic terminology into these artistic-economic models.
This means, that we often  will work in smaller groups.

The goal is to discuss these models with experts and audience on saturday 23rd in the frame of the symposium "what's the matter with Money?". Our propositions will build the start of this symposium and should contrast the speeches, which are hold for the TEDx event just afterwards.

During the week, we will have several interventions by people form very different areas.
- Tuesday will be a skype meeting with two activists of the common wealth economy, which looks to be quite radical but practical alternative economic system. (www.gemeinwohloekonomie.org)
- Wednesday a concrete alternative working structure amongst artists will be presented by Christoph Ragg, which I would like to discus in relation to your own concrete experiences.
- Thursday a specialist in behavioural economy (Marieke Huysentruyt) is invited to explain why economy is mainly run irrationally.
- And finally, Friday, there will be the philosopher and economist Georgios Papadopoulos, who will join us the last day to talk specifically about 'currency'.


Preparation
I found a text, which is underpinning very well, what I try to establish as the approach of this workshop. It's the introduction in Franco 'Bifo' Berardi new book "The Uprising". I would like to share it with you; if you find time, pleas read it!

As preparation for the discussions around Christoph Ragg's proposition, please take a close look into the institutional/legal/economic model you are currently working in as an artist. If you have anything interesting to propose, feel welcomed! We are going to mesh it up!

Also, If you have any interesting films/books to share please take them with you! We will make a library and probably we still have the energy to see some films in the evening.